


Great Minds Think Alike

by justaddfiction



Category: RWBY
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Beeunion, Bumblebee - Freeform, Bumbleby - Freeform, Bumbleby Week 2017, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Past Abuse, Past Relationship(s), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-Volume 4 (RWBY), Reunion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-10-09
Packaged: 2019-01-11 01:26:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12311910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justaddfiction/pseuds/justaddfiction
Summary: Blake crept as close as she dared, nearly overhead from the two voices, and peered down. Circling each other in a pre-battle dance were the two pillars of her world, the objects of her utmost hatred and her utmost love: Adam and Yang.





	Great Minds Think Alike

**Author's Note:**

> In Hanakotoba, the Japanese flower language used for the village names in Volume 4, Sayuri or Orange Lily means "Hatred/Revenge" and Himawari or Sunflower means "Respect/Passionate Love/Radiance."

Industrial lights flickered overhead in the warehouse. Shelves and crates stood stocked with White Fang masks, uniforms, flags, and weapons. Huge, ominous cages scored with claw and teeth marks cast slotted shadows on the terrorist paraphernalia. 

It was close to 3:00 a.m., and the building was nearly empty. The mostly ruined settlement of Sayuri lay not too far from the outer borders of Mistral, cradled in the foothills of the mountains that protected the kingdom. It was here that the extremist offshoot of the White Fang kept their regional distribution center. Blake had found the fairly nondescript building’s location and shift schedule in a privately shared document on Ilia’s scroll. The White Fang preferred to operate at night in human-dominated Mistral, giving faunus the advantage in the dark. However, a few hours’ drive into the countryside and out of the domain of humans, they preferred to work in broad daylight with no authorities in sight. At this time of night, it should have been empty and dark.

The document would have meant nothing to her without the comment, highlighted in yellow over the graveyard shift: Adam Taurus’ recent tendency to use the place to plan and strategize in peace. As such, the miscellaneous drivers, loaders, and supervisors of day-to-day operation had left hours ago, leaving only the late-shift guards and Blake’s target.

Those guards already lay unconscious just inside the door when Blake arrived. Upon seeing this, she jumped backward out the door, activating her semblance to put a shadowy clone shield between her and this surprise. Mentally cursing the amount of trust she’d put into the note about Adam’s habit, she scanned the area. She looked for hidden attackers, her eyes scanning the light and shadows with equal ease, and her upper pair of ears swiveled to listen for voices, footsteps, or weaponry. There was nothing in the immediate vicinity. 

Cautiously, she walked back into the warehouse. The two guards still lay on their faces, and no one jumped out of the rafters to attack her. She crouched down and poked one guard with the blunt edge of her weapon. Nothing happened. She jabbed the other one, and still nothing happened. The guards were well and truly knocked out. One of them had a broken nose, and both of their guns had fallen a few feet away. What the White Fang could gain from injuring their own guards Blake could not guess.  More likely, there was a third party at work here - the enemy of her enemy, perhaps? Whoever they were, they had certainly made her life easier.  If this was a trap it clearly wasn't for her, but she was still on edge as she walked further inside.

Her boots made a  _ clack _ sound on the concrete floor that echoed through the building with every step. That was going to be a problem. She looked for a route that would let her echo less. The warehouse was on the smaller side for what it was, but still a massive room, with long aisles of tall metal shelving broken only by crosswise paths like the grid of city streets. The ceiling was dotted and lined with pipes and wiring, and the area just below it was criss-crossed with a sparse grid of rafters. The lights hanging from those rafters only lit the room below, which kept the area above in shadow. There were two footholds two-thirds of the way up the wall near one such rafter.  _ Perfect. _

She used her semblance to generate a shadow clone of herself. The duplicate felt like an extra, detached set of limbs, as easy to control as her own. Her aura was draining with every moment she maintained a substantial clone, so she worked fast. She jumped high and used her clone to step underneath and catch her.  The clone braced to lift her as Blake curled to jump.  They sprung up in sync, giving Blake the extra height she needed to jump up to the footholds in the wall. She let the clone dissipate, and her aura level stabilized. With one more jump she reached the rafters.

From above, she surveyed the inside of the warehouse. She had entered near the left side of the front of the building, from her perspective. More of the same parallel shelving she had observed ran front to back down the whole room. The center aisles in each direction were wider and more spacious than their parallel counterparts, but all were wide enough to allow forklifts to pass. There was an empty space near the back right corner where voices caught her attention. 

She snuck closer to the voices (but not too close) in a zig-zag path along the rafters, trying to ascertain how many people were there, and if they were friend or foe. Her upper ears swiveled forward again. A male voice spoke, and she shivered. It was him, all right. Adam Taurus. Her target. Her ex-boyfriend. Her abuser.

But then the other voice spoke, and Blake felt the wind leave her lungs altogether. A passing feather could have knocked her down. It was  _ Yang. _

She had to make sure her ears weren’t playing tricks on her - Blake had seen her former partner in every blonde human, heard her in every pun and pick-up line, in the year since the Fall of Beacon. So she crept as close as she dared, nearly overhead from the two voices, and peered down.

Circling each other in a pre-battle dance were the two pillars of her world, the objects of her utmost hatred and her utmost love: Adam and Yang. Adam looked the same as ever, unreadable behind his ever-present mask. The sickening panic of traumatic memory rose all at once in Blake’s chest at the sight of him.

Yang, on the other hand, had changed dramatically in the last year. Her missing right arm had been replaced with an advanced prosthetic (It was noticeably Atlesian; how had it reached her with the embargo? Was Weiss responsible? Blake saw an image of Weiss delivering the prosthetic to Yang as Ruby looked on. She had wanted the rest of Team RWBY to go on without her, but the thought was still heart-wrenching); she was sporting a new combat outfit that covered more, with a long coat like Blake's own; her numerous zippers and belts jingled with every movement, a different timbre from the quiet robotic hum of her new arm. Her lilac eyes burned with anger and hatred at the man across from her.

A building wave of fear swept over Blake, of Adam and for Yang. Her heart raced and she found it difficult to breathe. Her goal for the night, which had been to kill Adam, was now to protect Yang. But she could hardly do either without revealing herself to both of them. Adam she’d come prepared for, but Yang... The idea of Yang’s face turned toward her, filled with betrayal and hatred, was more than she could stand. So from her rafter perch, she watched with bated breath, trying to think of a course of action.

“...let you harm anyone else ever again,” Yang was saying.

Adam sneered. “Some harm is necessary for the right cause. Blood must be shed to win a revolution. Especially human blood like yours.”

“Like you care,” Yang snarled. “You know as well as I do that you stabbed a faunus girl, you fucking hypocrite.” It took Blake a second to realize that Yang was talking about her. She could already guess that this conversation was going to be too much to bear. But her masochistic curiosity wanted to hear it anyway. Some cautionary saying about curiosity and cats drifted through her head, but she swatted it away and kept watching.

“She is a traitor to the White Fang. What happened to her at Beacon is none of your business.”

As he spoke, the terror and pain of that night flooded back to Blake, and for just a moment she was lying in the rubble of the ruined dining hall again. 

_ His sword was buried in her stomach-- the world turned red-- Yang was running to her-- the world turned red again-- _

She wavered and nearly fell from the rafters before she took a deep breath and centered herself. She’d been in more precarious positions without falling, jumped over rooftops with ease and flown through the air to maim winged grimm.  These rafters should be as steady to her as solid ground - but the two people circling like unwitting sharks below had more power over her than anyone else. She changed her stance, lowering her center of gravity. No way would she let herself fall. Not now. Not here.

Yang glared at Adam. “She told me her old partner had become a monster. I didn't know until later that the monster who'd stabbed her was the same one. You hurt people, and twisted her into thinking you were right.” That was the long and short of it, Blake supposed. Though when she’d told Yang about it, she’d left out that she herself was one of the people he’d hurt. It was hard to say it out loud and make it true.

Behind the mask, Adam’s face was still unreadable. “I’m glad to know she spoke so much of me. I knew there was still love left in her heart.” Blake’s stomach twisted.

Yang’s eyes flashed red as her anger hit its threshold for her semblance. “Her ‘ _ partner _ .’ She didn't say you were that kind. But that makes you a special brand of monster, huh?” Her fists curled, but she still didn't attack. “The kind who feels entitled to hurting loved ones and innocent bystanders alike.”  _ Leave it to Yang to cut through the bullshit _ , Blake thought.

Adam laughed, a deranged, chilling cackle. “And what innocent bystander were you referring to? You? Mercury Black would say otherwise.” Yang frowned. Adam continued, “There are no innocent humans. There are only faunus, and scum to be wiped from the face of Remnant.”

“But why stop there, right? After all, you seemed pretty intent on wiping  _ Blake  _ from the face of Remnant!” Yang was furious. Sarcasm could not contain her anger, so it came bubbling out in her shaking voice. Her hair glowed pale yellow like molten glass but did not yet ignite outright.

Hearing Yang say her name like that - something in Blake’s mind stirred. Yang didn’t seem angry with her at all. In fact, she seemed to be angry on her behalf, and defending her from Adam once again. But that made no sense. No matter what Yang might have felt for Blake before, there was no way she didn’t hate her now. Right?

Adam dismissed Yang’s anger with his unshaken calm as much as with his words. “She was fine. She was able to walk, and even to carry you, not long after you fell unconscious.”  _ Well, I suppose that is true. Maybe it wasn’t so bad... _

“You stabbed her in the gut! She could have died!” Yang’s utter disbelief and contempt jolted Blake back to reality, where Adam’s insidious logic was absurd. “And the worst part of it is, you think you love her, and that she loves you.” Yang laughed once, a humorless, bitter bark of laughter that startled Blake. “I feel kinda bad for you. Let me tell you something: you don’t actually love her. If you did, you wouldn’t be able to even see her hurt. It would make you furious, and scared, and sick. And hurting her yourself would be unthinkable. If you actually loved her, you couldn’t stab her. You’d rather take the sword yourself.” Her breaking voice belied her sardonic tone.

Blake felt a rush of affection for Yang, and the overwhelming desire to hug her. The quietest hope began to thrum deep in her chest. Did that mean what she thought it meant…?

Adam frowned and said, more to himself than to Yang, “Hmm. Is that so?”

Rolling her eyes, Yang said, “Uh, yeah. You. Don’t. Love. Her. You just want to own her. Does that mask have built-in earplugs or something?” She scoffed and rolled her eyes, smiling at her own joke, as if to say, ‘ _ get a load of this guy.’ _

But he had understood more than that, just as Blake had. He spoke quietly, but his voice still seemed to fill the warehouse. “You’re in love with her too, aren’t you?”

Yang’s mocking smile dropped abruptly. Her eyes snapped back to him. She said nothing. Blake internally screamed.  _ Was  _ Yang in love with her too? After everything?

Adam bristled, raising his voice, which gained an echo as he began to yell in earnest. “You think you can just waltz in and take her? You have none of the history we have!” Out of instinct at hearing him like this, Blake ducked behind the nearest vertical beam and crouched down, holding her head in her hands. But she couldn’t stop herself from listening. Yang had hit a nerve, and Blake wasn’t sure if that would put him off-balance to give Yang the edge she needed, or fuel him and seal her fate. All four of Blake’s ears focused intently on the two figures below.

“First of all, no one is 'taking’ her, you possessive prick,” said Yang’s voice.

Adam ignored her. “You’re human,” he said derisively. “You think you spend two semesters of school together and suddenly you’re more important to her than I am? You’ll never know what it’s like to be faunus in a human’s world. Your angry ignorance is everything she hates about humanity. How could she love you?”

“I said you don’t love her. I have no idea who she loves.” At that, Blake turned to watch them again, trying to get a look at Yang’s face. But at this point in their circling, all Blake could see of her was golden hair and coattails. She tried to make sense of what Yang had said. She hadn't denied being in love with Blake, which seemed like an obvious thing to throw in his face if he was wrong. Underneath the terror of the current situation, the quiet hope from before ballooned into a very real possibility, one that refused to go away no matter how hard Blake pushed it out.  _ Oh, Yang. Just make it out of here okay and I’ll tell you exactly who I love. _

The two opponents had been circling each other for an eternity, neither making the first move. Blake knew them both too well not to understand why. Adam was taking pleasure from taunting Yang, trying to provoke her into mindless rage. Yang had learned her lesson the first time, but was reaching her limit even so. Blake could only pray that wasn’t as obvious to Adam as it was to her.

He broke the silence. “Pathetic. You’re in love with her, and she loves the man who maimed you. Allow me to put an end to your misery.” He reached for Wilt and Blush, and in response, Yang cocked Ember Celica in a fluid, powerful motion that would have left Blake weak in the knees in any other circumstances.

Instead, she panicked. She couldn’t let Yang fight him alone; the thought of further harm coming to Yang because of her was suffocating. She stood up from her place in the rafters and did the only thing she could think of: she shouted, “Wait!”

The two opponents instantly turned in tandem, to the voice that was their shared favorite of every voice in the world. A smirk curled up Adam’s face. Yang stared in shock.

“...Blake?” said Yang, dumbfounded. “What? How…?”

Blake drew Gambol Shroud and dropped to the ground directly between them. She faced Adam, brandishing the broad sheath-blade between him and Yang, as if to shield her. With her right hand, she aimed the gun in katana form at his face. Trying to keep her voice from breaking, she asked, “What will it take to get her out of here unharmed?”

The smirk only widened. “Excuse me?” he asked.

“Whatever you get out of hurting her, you can get from me instead.” Blake steeled her gaze, willing her shaking hands to stop. “Stop messing around with my friends and go straight to the source. You wanna hurt me? Fine! I’m right here! You want me to beg on my knees for her life, or for you to take me back, or whatever twisted whim you have today? I’ll do it, I don’t care! Whatever you want,” she finished, losing the wind from her sails. “Just let her go.” Her eyes watered and blurred her vision. She just wanted this to be over.

Behind her, Yang shouted, “Blake, what the fuck?” She grabbed Blake by the shoulder with her robotic arm, the thought of which only made Blake’s shaking hands and vision worse.

Adam frowned and shook his head. “Even if I wasn’t going to kill her before, after that display, well. I’ll be sure to make you watch.” Blake despaired at the loss of her final bargaining chip. Which left only one thing to do.

She generated two shadow clones, which ran straight for Adam to block his view. She whipped around, hung the sheath of Gambol Shroud behind her on its magnet, and with her newly freed hand grabbed the prosthetic arm still holding her shoulder. She pulled Yang with her and ran toward the exit. In this position, they weren’t as fast as Blake was used to, but it was still faster than Adam could go with the shadows in his way. She pulled Yang down a crosswise aisle of shelving and picked another row toward the exit. It was the closest to a meaningful zigzag as she could get in this grid of shelving. She just needed to get them out of here--

“Blake! Blake, what are you doing?” asked Yang.

“I’m getting us out of here,” Blake called over her shoulder. Another few seconds and they would reach the front doors where the poor guards lay. She felt the drain on her aura stop as Adam sliced the clones to shreds behind her.

The world seemed to turn sharply as Yang dug in her heels and swung Blake around to the side, tossing them both behind a row of empty pallets. Blake balanced herself into a crouch, and looked up to find her stance mirrored by her former partner. This time it was Blake’s turn to ask, “What are you doing?”

Yang looked at Blake and shook her head, her golden curls catching the orange industrial light in a poor imitation of the flame they could generate. “You can run if you want, but I’m staying. This ends tonight.”

Blake was still holding on to Yang’s prosthetic wrist with one hand. She sheathed the other half of Gambol Shroud, freeing her other hand to grab Yang’s wrist as well. “Please, Yang, you have to leave. I can’t let you fight him.” She ignored the crack in her voice and her blurring vision, and hoped Yang would too.

Yang pulled her arm away sharply. “Let me? What the hell?” She looked at Blake with narrowed red eyes, confused and hurt and above all, furious. “You abandon me for months, then when I’m finally close to getting revenge, you show up out of nowhere, pull an extra-as-hell stunt, then drag me away with no explanation? Who died and made you my mother?”

This was exactly what she’d wanted to avoid, what had kept her from acting as soon as she’d seen Yang. This night was turning out to be all her worst fears piled one on top of another. She begged Yang, “Please, let me bring you to safety. After that, you can do whatever you want. I just can’t lose you.”

Yang turned her head and muttered, “You seemed pretty eager to lose me until now.”

“N-no! It wasn’t- I couldn’t-” Blake took a deep, shuddering breath and steadied her voice. “You have every right to be mad at me, Yang. And I swear I'll tell you everything. But please, can we do this once you’re safe?”

Adam’s footsteps, slow and steady, strode ever closer. Yang sighed, and her expression softened slightly. “Neither of us will be safe until this monster is in the ground. We both know that. For my own sake, I have to face him. And why are you here, if not to get even?” Blake had no response to that.  _ Damn Yang and her ability to read people _ . Her point made, Yang continued, “We stand the best chance if we work together.” She offered her other hand, the flesh and blood hand. “But whether you fight or not, just please, don’t run too far. I can’t lose you again.”

Blake looked into Yang’s eyes, which still burned scarlet, but stared at her with determination now, rather than anger. Yang was right, of course she was right. After the briefest moment of hesitation, Blake wiped away her tears and took Yang’s proffered hand. They stood up together. Blake drew Gambol Shroud in dual-wielding form and held the two blades at her sides.

Yang smiled darkly. With her red eyes, the effect was chilling in a not entirely unattractive way. ( _ In a “please pin me against a wall” way, _ thought Blake.) Yang said, “Okay, Ruby’s just called ‘Bumblebee.’”

Blake stood for half a second in confusion. Was Ruby nearby? What did she mean by--  _ oh _ .  Yang meant metaphorically. Using the old team attacks would give them a method of communication only they would understand, and reduce chaos and friendly fire. They hadn’t fought together or even seen each other in so long that they were out of sync, and they needed every advantage for this fight.

“You remember our section of the playbook, right?” asked Yang.

Blake nodded. “As if I could forget.” It had always been her favorite of the team attacks.

“Good. How’s your aura?” The footsteps were getting louder.

“Decent, drained a bit from semblance use. You should know, his semblance is like yours. The more you hit him, the more he stores the energy. You’ve... experienced the result.”

Yang nodded gravely. “Got it. Okay, on my signal, Bumblebee sub-attack Gamma. We’ll use this old warehouse to our advantage.” She moved toward the aisle from which Adam approached, ready to run into flanking position. 

As Yang’s back turned, Adam’s footsteps echoed oddly in Blake’s ears, and she could almost hear the victims of his “accidents” scream across the years. For all Yang’s confidence, Blake was terrified. She came here ready to die if that was what it took to kill Adam - but now, thanks to the ballooning hope from the conversation she’d overheard, she couldn’t leave Yang. Not without telling her.

The floor of her stomach dropped out as if on a trapdoor, but she ignored it and forced herself to speak up. “Yang?” she asked, gathering her courage for what she was about to do.

Yang turned back around to her. “What is it?” Backlit, her silhouette was outlined in gold as the incandescent light filtered through her blonde hair and reflected off the trim of her duster. Blake took in every swaying lock of hair, every rise and fall of Yang’s chest, the way her red eyes were open and honest, even in anger, and the way her every movement suggested the easy confidence of physical strength. Gods, Yang was so beautiful.

There was no way to say it with words. Blake stepped forward, rapidly closing the space between them. She pulled Yang into a brief, desperate kiss. Yang froze in surprise, but leaned in toward Blake as the kiss ended. Blake broke away quickly. Adam’s approaching footsteps were far too close, and the two of them needed time to get into position.

Blushing furiously, worried that she’d overstepped, Blake whispered, “Be safe,” and turned toward her position. After a moment, Yang seemed to remember where she was, shook her head, and turned back around, muttering something Blake couldn’t hear.

Feeling rather distracted herself, Blake ran as fast and quietly as she could down the aisle to flank Adam. She hadn’t gone very far before she heard his footsteps directly opposite her position. Then they stopped, and so, briefly, did her heart.

On pure instinct, Blake dove forward down the aisle into a somersault. Behind her, she heard the whistle of Adam’s sword and a deep, rumbling crash as the shelves next to where she’d just been came tumbling down.

“Tsk, tsk,” said Adam. “You know I can hear you, Blake. Come out and face me, or she gets the same.”

_ He can’t, he doesn’t know where she is yet. If he did, he would keep silent to surprise her, like he did to me just now.  _ Doing her best to ignore his taunts, she scrambled to the other side of the shelving and climbed up, easily reaching the rafters. She kept to the shadows to reduce the chance of him seeing her. She wasn’t overly worried about herself on that front - Adam’s mask, while mysterious and intimidating, did not allow for stellar peripheral vision. She wondered if Yang had figured that out before suggesting this version of the Bumblebee attack. From above, Blake could see Adam pacing the narrow open space. One shelving aisle behind him, against the side wall of the warehouse, Yang looked up expectantly at her. Seeing Blake safely in position, Yang breathed a silent sigh of relief, and made the signal gesture with her hand.

Blake grabbed the end of Gambol Shroud’s ribbon and threw the sickle toward Yang. As soon as she had it securely, Yang shouted, “Now!” as a decoy signal. Blake was already in motion.

Adam turned toward the voice and Blake leapt down behind the rafter where she had been perched, clutching the end of the ribbon in her right hand and the sheath blade in her left. As it caught on the two rafter beams between the two girls, it angled Blake’s swing toward Adam, and she aimed her feet at his back. Simultaneously, with the upward force from Blake’s fall and an assisting blast from Ember Celica, Yang catapulted up to the rafters. 

Blake’s feet made contact with Adam’s back. She slammed him into the shelves, feeling as much as hearing a thud that hopefully took a big chunk out of his aura. She backflipped away onto the ground. Yang had already landed above, and now dropped the other half of Gambol Shroud directly into Blake’s waiting right hand.

Already back on his feet, Adam swung at her in a broad arc, and she blocked his strike with her sword. Her heart was beating fast, too fast, but her hands were steady and she found the strength to press forward. As they stood locked, the sliding click and shrill blast of Ember Celica sounded from above. 

A volley of punched shots rained down, and Blake began a flurry of quick strikes and dodges, keeping his attention focused on her to leave him vulnerable to Yang’s attack. He could parry Blake, or he could block Yang’s onslaught, but he couldn’t do both. He tried to maneuver around Blake to put her between him and Yang, but Blake kept herself on the far side. She kept seeing what would have been openings behind him if not for the hail of dust rounds, but she reminded herself to stay on this side. Adam was having an easier time predicting where she would be with her possible locations halved. Something was going to slip. She needed a switch in tactics. She yelled, “Where there’s smoke!” and left a duo of low-quality, shadowy clones before darting away.

“There’s fire!” Yang shouted back, leaping off from the rafters and blasting downward with Ember Celica to cushion her fall. Blake regrouped with her and together they tried to wear Adam down. Yang shot at him from the side, forcing him to dodge straight into Blake’s waiting blades. She leapt into the air over Adam, slicing at him from above, flash-stepped up out of his reach, then flipped down in front of him. With a  _ whump  _ she heard as well as felt, he knocked her away using the hilt of his sword. She got back up and ran back into the fight opposite Adam from Yang.

Across from her, Yang was focused on taking the brunt of his attack to fuel her own for later. But Blake was getting anxious as she darted behind his back, trying to trip him or disarm him. Both Yang and Adam were taking more than enough damage to trigger their semblances - Adam’s hair and sword glowed almost non-stop during the fight - but neither were showing signs of using them.

Distracted by this thought, she was caught off-guard when Adam grabbed her by the straps of her top and threw her at the nearest aisle of shelves.

She hit the upper levels with a crash, and the force of her impact tilted them just enough that they began to tip backwards. Her stomach dropped as her perch fell beneath her. Readjusting her weight, she stood on the metal bars and rode the falling shelves almost to the ground. She jumped off to the right and rolled, saving the aura she would have needed to stick the landing. The shelves hit the floor, sliding back and hitting the warehouse wall. The screech of metal on concrete pierced the air, and all four of Blake’s eardrums. She winced and put a hand to one of her upper ears.

Off to her left, on the other side of the shelves that had just fallen, another shelving unit wobbled and fell, this time with Adam spread-eagled against it. He maneuvered and, like Blake, landed gracefully, facing the way he’d come through. 

The falling shelves had spread a cloud of dust into the air, and the lights behind it gave it a fiery glow. Blake saw a silhouette against the cloud before Yang leapt through it, her long blonde hair and coattails trailing dramatically behind her. Blake’s heart fluttered. She’d spent so long preoccupied with protecting Yang and with their defeat at Adam’s hands, she’d almost forgotten what a force of nature Yang was on the battlefield.

Yang landed fist-first, and Adam blocked her with his sword, edge-first. Blake almost cried out, before realizing Yang’s prosthetic hand pushed against it without being cut. Whatever it was made of, it was much tougher than her old arm. Blake shook herself and began running to the fight.

Adam attacked Yang with a series of blindingly fast strikes and shots. Yang dodged and returned in kind, until one shot from Blush knocked her back a few feet. Blake took the opportunity to dive in on the offensive.

After a flurry of blows from as many directions as she could manage, she went for a leg sweep, and instantly regretted it. He stood steady, flipped his sword and stabbed down, hard. She rolled away just in time, but the near miss incensed Yang, who charged recklessly and got a vicious kick to the chest that knocked the wind out of her.

Yang staggered. Adam angled his sword. The red on his mask and in his hair glinted a more brilliant shade of red. He smiled.

Blake cried, “Look out!” But Yang wasn’t reacting quickly enough, still catching her breath. Blake scrambled toward Yang. She heard the  _ click  _ and saw the menacing glow of Wilt as it separated from Blush, and with a last burst of speed she reached Yang and shoved her out of the way.

Searing pain tore across her back as Adam’s semblance cut through cloth, aura, and skin, and she screamed involuntarily. Her whole body felt limp as she tumbled forward onto the ground. She tried to get up, but couldn’t; every nerve in her back burned white-hot, and moving any muscles there only made it worse. Her remaining aura healed the cut as far as it could, dulling the pain somewhat, before her reserves ran out. She felt more than saw the swirling shadows over her whole body as her aura depleted completely. A similar darkness pushed in on the edges of her vision, enticing her to lose consciousness, but she forced herself to stay awake.

A shockwave shook the warehouse to its foundations as Yang activated her semblance with an incoherent bellow. The blast pushed Blake further along the floor, the movement tearing at both sides of the wound. She sobbed.

Looking up (and wincing at the movement), she saw Yang dueling Adam, hair aflame and eyes scarlet. She tore into him, taking every strike and slash as fuel for the fire. He’d used up his stored energy, but Yang had saved hers, and it paid off. His aura rippled red as she wore the last of it down. She punched him upside the head, and his mask fell off and skittered across the floor.

He ducked under her other arm as it came around, and moved closer to her, too close. Blake watched helplessly as he grabbed Yang, swung her around, and slammed her into the wall. He pinned her robotic hand on the wall behind her with his left arm, and with his right, pressed the sharp edge of Wilt against her neck. He made a slow, deliberate cut, and though it left no mark, a mottled yellow glow signaled that Yang had joined Blake and Adam in having no aura left.

Blake gasped, “No, don’t hurt her,” but she was too far away, too quiet to hear. 

_ Too quiet to hear. _

Mustering the last of her strength, gritting her teeth to keep from crying out, she reached for the main piece of Gambol Shroud where it had fallen from her hands. She rose shakily to her feet. Adam didn’t turn - he hadn’t heard her.

His attention was held entirely by Yang, who snarled at him, spitting fury like sparks from a crackling fire. Two pairs of red eyes glared at each other. “I should have killed you when I had the chance,” he said.

“Then why didn’t you?”

“ _ She _ got in the way.” For a moment Blake stood petrified, sure that he’d noticed her. Any moment, he would turn around, and that would be the end of both girls. Instead, he stayed intent on Yang. A fine line of red appeared along Yang’s throat as the blade’s edge pressed further in. She sucked in a breath and tilted her head away from the blade. “But this time, you’ll have no savior. I’m going to enjoy this.”

Blake considered her options. She could shoot him, and risk hitting Yang. Or, she could stab him, and risk the blade going through on the other side and stabbing Yang. Besides, any movement coming from behind him pushed him forward, and risked his sword slitting Yang’s throat. But to get at him from any other angle, he’d see her, and she’d lose her only chance. She paused a few steps behind him, racking her brain for a plan to keep Adam from hurting Yang.

Yang looked over Adam’s shoulder. Her eyes met Blake’s and widened for a brief moment, before resuming their narrowed defiance at Adam.

“Do you have any last words?” he asked her. Blake raised her sword in desperation; a potentially injured Yang was better than a definitely dead one.

At that, Yang pushed him off, his sword glancing on her shoulder as he stumbled. Blake thrust Gambol Shroud up into his back as far as it would go.

He dropped Wilt and Blush. They clattered to the ground, dull and unthreatening without their master. His knees gave out, and as he fell, Blake pulled the blade out and stepped back. 

She had wanted this, prepared for this, but she still felt sick to her stomach as he collapsed forward, blood seeping up through the puncture wound and staining the white design on his suit as red as the rose it surrounded. The same blood was all over her sword and dripping onto her hands. She could see his face without his mask for the first time in years, and it was contorted in pain. He was startlingly, classically handsome, even with a scar down his jaw and a broken nose that had never quite healed well. And seeing his eyes uncovered, she remembered how he charmed her into following him so long ago. Those eyes were glassy with pain but managed to fix an intense stare on Blake.

His chest heaved as he gasped for each breath. “Traitor,” he managed. His head lolled to the side. With a final, rattling breath, his lungs gave out and were still.

Blake fell to her knees. Adam was dead. She had killed him. Relief and grief both rocked her. She realized she was crying. The shuddering movement was exacerbating the already terrible pain in her back, but she didn’t try to stop. 

She didn’t grieve for her abuser, who had dismembered Yang, campaigned for the death of all humans, and co-orchestrated the Fall of Beacon. But he had been her friend, once. There had once been the potential for someone good and kind and just, someone who could have made positive change in the world. But he had chosen cruelty and violence, over and over again. Even when it was unnecessary, he found excuses to cause suffering. He did so particularly when it came to her and her friends, as tonight had proven. In the end he made it clear: it was Yang’s life or his. That was no choice to Blake.

She felt a hand placed gingerly on her shoulder. “Blake, I’m sorry.”

Blake shook her head. She hadn’t realized how hard she was crying until she tried to speak. “N-no, I mean, I’m, relieved?” She tried to take a deep breath but kept crying. “He killed, so many people, and would have, have, killed more. He almost killed you-” at that thought, she flashed back to the Fall.

_ She ran into the chaos of Beacon’s courtyard. She was weaponless and radiating intense negative emotion; surely the grimm would be crawling toward her any second. She looked down at her partner, who she was carrying in her arms. Yang was a flopping, ragdoll-like dead weight, taller and heavier than Blake was. The bloody stump of her right arm twitched with her heartbeat. Her eyes were closed tight, her jaw hung slack. Clawing, vicious guilt built up in Blake’s chest. This was all her fault. _

_ “Blake,” said Yang’s voice. That was impossible, she was unconscious, right there. That wasn’t how this went. “Blake, you’re safe. He can’t hurt you. He’s dead.” _

She started. The world shifted again. It was still dark, but now she was in the White Fang warehouse in Sayuri. There was still an unconscious body in front of her, but it was Adam, not Yang. And yet it was still her fault.

It was a minute before she could speak. “I’m back. Thank you.” She took a deep breath, and noticed she had stopped crying. “It’s just, the fact that it came to this…” She hiccuped, and winced at the pull on her back.

The sound of a zipper made Blake turn to look behind her, turning her whole body to keep from twisting her back. Yang looked shell-shocked and distant, but was apparently present enough to have pulled a roll of bandages and some tape from the pockets on her belt. “You’re losing blood. We need to get you patched up. Maybe we should do that somewhere else. Away from- him.” Yang’s empty stare faced Adam. It would probably be better for both of them to leave, thought Blake.

She nodded. “Your shoulder, too.” Adam’s sword had left an angled cut near Yang’s collarbone as it left her neck. Blood was beginning to stain the neckline of her jacket.

“Oh, yeah. That too. Come on, let’s get out of here.” Yang retrieved Gambol Shroud's sheath from where Blake had dropped it. Blake cleaned the blade off on her coat (which was ruined anyway) and sheathed it. The magnetic belt she'd used to carry it lately had been cut, so she tied it to her belt loops and hung her weapon at her hip. Her shoulders protested the twisting motions, pulling at her wound, but she'd deal with that in a moment.

Yang offered to help her walk over, but the last thing Blake wanted was to give her another, more literal, burden. They had walked out the doors toward an outbuilding on the warehouse premises when Blake misstepped on the gravel. Regaining her balance used just the wrong muscles in her back. The pain caught up with her, and she stumbled. Her hands and knees scraped against gravel as she landed.

“That's it,” said Yang. “I'm carrying you.” Before Blake could protest, Yang swept her into a fireman’s carry, carefully keeping anything from hitting her back. Blake considered insisting on walking herself, but decided that resistance was more likely to make Yang unsteady and cause her to fall, which would hurt both of them unnecessarily. Definitely for that reason. Certainly not because Yang’s powerful shoulders felt much more secure than her own shaking legs. They walked like this in relative silence to the outbuilding, a sort of garage and loading bay with some trucks parked outside. 

Yang gently deposited Blake onto the concrete floor of the outbuilding. Blake took off her coat and braced herself. She felt Yang roll up the back of her shirt as gently as she could, but it still stung where the fabric pulled away from sticky drying blood.  Yang set about dressing Blake's back with crosswise bandages that held the wound shut.

As she waited, feeling her back pull together and begin to feel right again, Blake wondered where to begin. Yang had suffered so much on her behalf, and what had Blake done for her in return? How could she possibly ask for forgiveness yet? She was in no position to ask for anything more from Yang.

So when it was her turn to play nurse, Blake was silent as she took the first aid kit and taped a square of gauze to Yang’s collarbone. Yang took off her scarf-pillow-whatever it was and set it down next to Blake’s coat. Blake tried very hard not to think of a bigger pile of their discarded clothing.  _ Damn it, Blake, focus. _

With that taken care of, the silence in which they had worked now hung heavy in the air. 

Blake got up and pulled out her scroll. “I checked the huntsman mission boards before coming here. There’s a bounty on him we can collect. We should call it in and split the money.” Yang nodded in agreement.

Scroll service was pretty bad out here, but she managed to get through to a police station in the next town over, where they had a small-town doctor who could pronounce Adam dead and the bounty completed. Answering “ _ Alive or dead? _ ” with “Dead” was harder than Blake thought it would be.

She hung up the scroll and relayed the doctor’s arrival time to Yang, who responded with a noncommittal hum. There was nothing left for Blake to do that could put off the talk they needed to have. She sighed and walked over to where Yang stood.

“So,” said Blake.

“So,” said Yang.

“I guess I owe you an explanation.”

Yang opened her mouth as if to speak, pursed her lips, and exhaled. “Why were you trying so hard to die in that fight?”

That was not the question Blake was expecting. “What?”

“When you first showed up, you offered yourself like a damn martyr. And then later, you took the semblance hit for me.” Her eyebrows knitted in concern. “If you’re feeling suicidal, you should talk to someone. And stay away from life-or-death fights.”

That was an alarming conclusion for Yang to have drawn, but Blake saw where she was coming from. “Yang, it’s not like that. I don’t want to die. I just wanted to…”  _ To protect you. To keep you out of harm’s way at any cost. Yeah, Blake, any chance you could be a little more extra? I think there’s some scrap of drama you haven’t managed to overuse yet.  _ “I’d just- I’d rather it was me than you.”  _ Shit, that’s even worse. _

Yang frowned. “Well, I wouldn’t. Look, you don’t need to protect me. I could honestly use a bit less protection.” She made a fist with her prosthetic hand.

Oh. Of course she would feel that way, after all the recovery and retraining she went through. “I don’t doubt your abilities, Yang. You’re stronger than I am in so many ways.”

“If you feel that way, act like it,” Yang insisted. “When we’re in a fight, we need to trust each other and look at our abilities honestly. It’s better strategically for me to take the big hits so I can use my semblance. You’ve seen me do it before.”

“Yes, I have! I’ve seen more than enough, actually, of you jumping into lethal danger on my behalf.”

“And you think I don’t feel the same way?” Yang asked heatedly. She seemed to deflate, and her voice was quieter when she said, “Blake, try to see it the way I do. You run away without a word, for a year. A year! And when I finally see you again, the first thing you do is offer to get yourself killed for me. Then when we fight together for the first time since Beacon, you give me a- a goodbye kiss!” She blushed but ignored it, pressing her point. “And then, just as I think we’ve got our rhythm back, you shove me out of the way to take the same kind of hit that took off my arm. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were trying really hard to make me live without you.” Her voice broke, and the pain written in her face seemed to shatter her. It certainly shattered Blake. “Tonight was the second time I had to see that monster cut you down, and the third time I thought I’d lost you forever. And the thing I just don’t understand is why you left at all.”

To this, Blake had no answer. The guilt she’d been running from overtook her, and knowing no better way to express it, she fell to her knees. “I’m so sorry,” she said, “I’m sorry I put you in danger that night, and I’m sorry I ran. Seeing you hurt so badly because of me…” Her voice broke. “I thought you’d be safer without me. But I only made it worse. I hurt you, and I’m sorry.”

“Blake-”

“Anything I can do to make it up to you, I will.” Blake sank back on her heels, hung her head, and threw Gambol Shroud at Yang’s feet. It felt stupid, but words were failing her and only action could speak loudly enough. Nothing else could convey what she meant--

“Blake.” Yang’s voice was weary. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Startled, Blake looked up at Yang.  “I- I know, I didn’t mean to- to imply- ” she stammered, “It was a symbolic gesture--”

As a small, wavering smile grew on Yang’s face and tears began to pool in the corners of her eyes, she said, “Stop being dramatic. I don’t need a stupid gesture, I need a hug.”

Blake rose slowly to her feet, unsure of herself. Yang opened her arms, and Blake needed no further prompting. She fell into Yang and sobbed, holding onto her like a climber who suddenly realizes she’s afraid of heights: tightly, like her life depended on it, and with no immediate plans to move anywhere else. Yang pulled her close, and to Blake her strong, mismatched arms felt like the first safe haven in a world long gone to hell. She noticed after a moment that Yang was crying too, though her own sobs were drowning out the quieter noise Yang was making. She decided not to point it out, but only held her tight and tried to reassure her, “I’m not going anywhere, Yang, I won’t leave you again.”

***

Not long later, Blake was clinging to Yang on the back of Yang’s motorcycle. The roar of the wind and the engine drowned out any potential conversation, so instead Blake held onto Yang and enjoyed the scenery. It was dark, and though she knew Yang could only see what her headlights illuminated, Blake could see the countryside in all directions as it flew by. Mountains and forests fell away in the predawn dark. 

Far behind them, the warehouse was probably swarming with Mistral police and press by now. The small-town doctor and an accompanying small-town police officer had taken Blake and Yang’s statements and officially confirmed their completion of the bounty mission. The officer had done two double-takes: first at the high-profile target, then at the girls’ Huntress licenses, which each read “Granted for Heroism at the Battle of Beacon Academy.” He’d looked at them differently after that, and kept stealing glances at Yang’s arm. Both girls had been eager to leave when they were finally cleared to do so. No doubt the press would catch up with them later, but that could wait. What Blake desperately needed was sleep. Yang was fading too, and she needed to drive.

The doctor had recommended an inn from her town. The directions she gave them were simple: follow signs for Mistral until you hit a small town, and the building that says “Inn” is the one you want. 

The pair of White Fang sentries had apparently awoken at some point and fled the scene. Blake and Yang had made no effort to find them; the guards couldn’t exactly go back to the White Fang after failing their duty so miserably, and Blake was hardly eager to hand faunus over to human authorities in the best of circumstances.

The sign on the road as they entered the town said “Welcome to Himawari,” and the banner below it bore a stylized sunflower. The sleepy village was completely still in the misty grey light. It would have been dawn when they arrived if not for the shadows cast by the mountains in the east. But it could have been high noon in Vacuo for all Blake cared. She just wanted to sleep.

Yang parked her motorcycle in front of the inn. It took Blake a moment to let go of her waist and get up. They walked up the steps, and Yang took her hand. They must have been quite the sight for the poor teenage girl standing at the front desk on the graveyard shift: two wounded, bandaged Huntresses in full battle regalia, holding hands and asking for a room with the bitch face that accompanies 5 o’clock a.m. just after killing a man. Between Blake’s crop top showing off her stomach scar and Yang’s bright yellow robot arm, Blake supposed they looked simultaneously battle-hardened and not much older than the girl at the desk.

The girl, whose name tag read ‘Giada,’ nervously asked if they wanted a room with a double bed or two singles. Blake looked up at Yang, who looked back at her, then at their hands, and then said to Giada, “Double.” Blake smiled at her encouragingly and squeezed her hand. After they paid for the night, Giada handed them the key and pointed to hallway where the room was.

Blake was so tired when she reached the room, she dropped her gear and collapsed straight onto the bed, her face hitting the pillow with a low  _ ‘pof’  _ sound. She heard some mechanical clicks from the prosthetic detaching, then felt the bed shake, as Yang did the same. Blake was nearly asleep when she heard Yang murmur her name.

“Hmm?” replied Blake.

Yang’s voice was uncharacteristically small. “You’ll still be here when I wake up, right?” Familiar guilt wracked Blake. She shifted onto her side to see Yang’s face. Yang was lying on her back, but had turned her head to face Blake. Her eyes were half-lidded as she fought off sleep, and she was attempting to smile; her expression would have looked a bit silly in circumstances that didn’t make Blake feel so guilty.

Blake nodded, then realized that didn’t convey how serious she was. “I promise,” she said, and for extra emphasis took Yang’s hand in her own.

“Mmkay. Good,” Yang yawned, “g’night.” She closed her eyes, still holding Blake’s hand. 

A sudden, vivid memory made Blake sit up suddenly. She had seen Yang from that angle before, bandaged and unconscious in her battle outfit, missing her right arm. In response to Blake’s movement, Yang blearily opened her eyes and raised an eyebrow. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, I just-” Blake realized Yang would have no memory of lying on the ground at the docks, injured and holding hands. She’d been unconscious, after all. She laid back down and said, “Deja vu.” Yang hummed acknowledgement and closed her eyes. She was asleep almost immediately.

When Blake drifted off a couple minutes later, it was to thoughts of holding Yang’s waist on a never-ending midnight drive.

***

When Blake opened her eyes, early afternoon sunlight was shining through the window and onto her face. She blinked a few times to get used to it. “What’s up, sleepyhead?” asked Yang’s voice from her right.

Blake sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Yang was sitting next to her, playing a game on her scroll. She smiled at Blake, who smiled back and decided that waking up next to Yang was something she could definitely get used to. She yawned and stretched, then got up and walked to the bathroom to clean up.

When she returned, Yang had resumed her game, eyes narrowed in playful concentration. Her thumbs twiddled the controls for the game, and she talked over the vocal efforts of the little pixel ninjas. “We got a call to the room earlier - some reporter wanting to interview us. I said we weren’t up for it yet.”

“Good call.”

After some more twiddling and sound effects, she grinned and sat up straight. The tinny voice announced, “Flaming ninja wins! Total annihilation!” Yang pumped her fist into the air and whooped. Her grin was pure joy, and Blake caught herself staring. How long had it been since she’d seen Yang smile like that?

“Yang?” asked Blake.

Yang still watched her scroll intently, but the screen looked suspiciously main menu-like. “Hmm?”

“We should talk.”

Yang exhaled and locked her scroll, setting it down on the side table. “Okay, yeah. What did you want to talk about first?”

Blake turned her whole body to face Yang. She tried to gather her thoughts and regulate her breathing, but was only partially successful on each count. Seeing Yang so close, Blake’s eyes drifted to her lips and then immediately back up to her eyes when she realized she’d already kissed Yang, that actually happened last night,  _ what the shit Blake, what were you thinking. _ There was one thing she actually knew how to say, so she started with that and hoped she’d figure out the rest as she went. “I know I said this already, but I am so, so sorry for leaving. You probably figured this out, but, he threatened to kill you, and everyone else I care about. And just like I’ve always done, I ran away.”

“Well, not always,” noted Yang. “You ran towards the danger last night. Nearly gave me a heart attack, too. And according to him, it wasn’t the first time you… did that for me.” Yang looked down and put her left hand on her prosthetic arm. “I appreciate it, and I’m beyond honored, but I think I’ve made my feelings on the subject pretty clear.”

Blake shrugged awkwardly. “Sorry for scaring you. I just…” She blushed. “I couldn’t let you get hurt because of me again. It was just like you said; the idea of causing you harm, even indirectly, wasn’t something I could stand. I’d- what was it- ‘rather take the sword myself.’”

Yang blushed too, and rubbed the back of her neck. “I guess you heard that whole thing, huh?” She sighed. “I guess I’m a huge hypocrite, but it’s scary hearing you say it.”

“It was a lot scarier to see you do it,” said Blake.

“How do you think I feel?” asked Yang. Part of Blake’s brain thought, _But it’s different because I’m in love with you,_ but another part countered, _Well, that’s not as different as I thought._ _But the fact that I love you made me do something that hurt you._ _And now I have to make that up to you._

And then another thought:  _ But that’s the only thing keeping us apart anymore. We both want this. We just have to keep talking. _

After a moment, Blake said, “That’s fair. I’m sorry. But I think I can shed some light on why I felt like I had to, and also on why you can trust that I won’t do it again.”

That got Yang’s attention. “Go ahead.”

“I feel like it was my fault that you lost… that you got hurt. I know intellectually that’s not true, but it still feels true.”

Yang made a face. “I thought you’d probably blame yourself. It’s not your fault.”

“But if I had handled him on my own in the first place, I wouldn’t have been in enough danger for you to feel like you needed to rescue me, and you wouldn’t have lost your arm.” Blake touched the scar on her stomach from where the sword had gone through. The most pain she’d ever felt - but it had healed. It was the kind of wound that Aura was capable of healing. No such luck for a severed limb.

But Yang was shaking her head. “He made the decision to attack you. It’s his fault, end of story.”

Blake was getting frustrated; why couldn't she express what she meant? Yang didn’t understand, and until she understood, her forgiveness only made Blake feel guiltier. “I know, but, if I’d overpowered him before you got there, he wouldn’t have been able to hurt you. Or if I hadn’t fought back, he wouldn’t have had the energy from my attacks to use against you. I gave him the strength to hurt you!” Her voice shook. “If it weren’t for me, you would have passed him by altogether. My own gun gave him the energy to do it. I was the bait and the ammunition; he only had to pull the trigger.” She hadn’t been able to admit this out loud before, but now it came pouring out. “And on top of everything, he targeted you because he knew it would hurt me. You were only in danger because I care about you.”

“Blake, listen to me,” Yang said, grabbing Blake by the shoulders and staring directly into her eyes. “He didn’t have to hurt anyone. He chose to, which makes it his fault. You can’t expect yourself to be permanently invinceable or to never need help. I learned that the hard way,” she said, flexing the fingers of her right hand. “And as for you caring about me,” she dropped her gaze, “you’d have hurt me way more by not caring.”

“I-” Blake didn’t know what to say. Sun’s words back in Menagerie came to mind - “ _ It hurts more than anything the bad guys could ever do to us. _ ” He’d been right about Yang feeling the same way. She fell silent.

“Bear with me here,” said Yang. She took a deep breath. “Losing my arm was among the worst things that have ever happened to me. I still have nightmares about that night. I’d never even imagined that kind of pain, or fear, or helplessness.”

A fresh wave of guilt crashed over Blake. “I’m so, so sorry-”

“But, you know what?” Yang interrupted, “When I heard you scream - when I saw you lying there, with him pulling a sword out of you…” Her steadying hands began to shake, and her voice broke. “I thought you were gonna die. And the only thing I could do was stop him by any means necessary.” She took another deep breath and regained her composure. “So I don’t regret the decision to attack him. Yeah, it led to one of the worst things that’s ever happened to me. But I would rather lose my other arm and both legs than walk away from a chance to save your life.” she finished.

There was nothing to say that didn’t sound shallow in comparison, so Blake stayed silent.

“But all this is beside the point,” Yang continued, eager to move on from that subject, “I could have dealt with losing my arm. It would have taken a while, but I could have felt better about it if my friends were there. Weiss couldn’t help it - she didn’t want to leave, her dad made her. Ruby and Team Jun-” She froze, and Blake tensed. Yang apparently decided not to go down that road, because she took a deep breath and continued, “Ruby, Jaune, Nora, and Ren at least stayed for a little while, and when they left, Ruby left a note and sent letters. The letters didn’t always arrive, but at least she tried. But you didn’t even say goodbye. You couldn’t have, I dunno, left a note? Something like, ‘Sorry but I have to leave or my crazy ex will kill you?’ It was like, it wasn’t enough that when I woke up, I had lost my arm. I had lost you too.” She looked away and gritted her teeth.

That part was harder to put into words. But Yang deserved an explanation. Blake took a deep breath and tried to sort out her thoughts. “Part of it was fear. I thought for sure he’d find out about any sign of attachment and use it against me. You have no idea what it’s like. That’s not a criticism; I’m glad you’ve never been abused. But it's hard to explain it, for a lot of reasons. 

“I had to tiptoe around him to avoid making him angry, and anything I did that he didn’t like made me a bad person. But it was much more subtle than that. There was no one thing I could point to and say, ‘this is definitely bad,’ it was a bunch of little things that could always make sense from his point of view. By the time I realized what he’d done was inexcusable, it had been years and he had a strangle hold over my mind. Leaving him was the one time I ran away that I don’t regret. The more time I spent away from him, and with you guys, the better I felt. But when I saw him at the Fall, it was like relapsing. It was like no time at all had passed.

“I was convinced I had to cut all contact with you whatsoever or he’d use it as an excuse to kill you. And it sounds ridiculous now! How could he possibly have known if I’d given you a note, or even if I’d stayed with you and prepared an army of friends to kill him? He wouldn’t have known either way. And it’s not like he didn’t already know I cared about you. But at the time, I couldn’t imagine staying any longer than absolutely necessary. I could only see him, coming back for you, torturing you, killing you. And it would have been my fault.”

Yang looked back over at her, opened her mouth as if to speak, and then pulled Blake into a hug instead. Blake curled up and nestled her head against Yang’s shoulder. She was glad for the warm contact, and glad that Yang kept initiating physical affection. It gave her the strength to keep talking. As Yang stroked her hair, Blake sniffled and breathed deeply, wrestling her voice back under control.

“How could I possibly have risked your life just to stay with you? What kind of selfish monster would that have made me? But the actually selfish part was to think I was the only one who should have been involved in that decision. I should have stayed, and told you what was going on, and let you decide whether you still wanted me around. We could have avoided all this.  I’m so, so sorry.”

From over her head, she heard Yang say, “I forgive you. And I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry he did that to you, and I’m sorry I doubted you. I could never understand why you would just leave. I could only come up with ‘she doesn’t care about you.’ But now I understand.”

Blake sat back up. “You have nothing to apologize for. I doubted me too. Honestly, the fact that you want to be here with me after all this is mind-boggling.”

Yang laughed briefly to herself. “What?” asked Blake.

“It just all kind of hit me, that we’ve both been angsting over the idea of each of us hating each other, but neither of us did. We just had our heads so far up our asses that we made assumptions instead of just talking about it.”

Blake chuckled at that. “We’ve both been pretty stupid about this.”

“In the same stupid ways, too. We’re the weirdest fucking pair, aren’t we?”

Maybe it was having Yang back, but a part of Blake’s mind that usually didn’t contribute knew the perfect response to that. “Well, we aren’t yet, are we?,” she asked, carefully raising one eyebrow.

“What?”

“A fucking pair.”

Yang giggled more than the innuendo warranted to hide that she was blushing scarlet. “A pun  _ and  _ a sex joke. I’m so proud of you,” she said, before Blake joined her in giggling. The relief of being safe, whole, and together turned into full-fledged laughter at nothing that lasted until neither of them could breathe.

As they calmed down, Yang reached over and took Blake’s hands in her own. Yang’s were one warm and one cool against Blake’s cold fingers, and the physical contact felt like an anchor to the real world. The real world where Yang was holding her hands, which was supposed to be the stuff of daydreams and idle fantasies. For a moment, she thought she was having another vivid dream; she’d wake up and Yang would be far away and Adam would be out there waiting to kill them both.

What convinced her it was real, though, was the cool, too-smooth texture of Yang's right hand. She couldn’t have imagined that. Blake idly rubbed her thumb across the back of it, before realizing-

“Can you feel that?”

“Hmm?”

“Your right hand,” Blake clarified. “How much feeling do you have in it?”

“Oh. Uh, some. I mean, it’s an aura conduit, so I can feel contact and pressure. But textures feel kinda dull, like I’m wearing a glove all the time, and I can’t feel temperature with it. It's pretty weird. Took me a while to get used to it.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Don’t be. I mean, I learned how to get along without it. It’s just nice to have a second hand again for more help with the important things: eating, getting dressed, fighting… and this,” she lifted her right hand, and Blake’s left with it.

“Good to know you have your priorities straight,” said Blake with a half-hearted eye roll, though she really was touched.

An eye-twinkling grin spread across Yang’s face. “I don’t know if I’d call them that. In fact,” she murmured, her voice dropping into a register that Blake found unfairly alluring, “I’d say my priorities at the moment are pretty crooked.” As she spoke, she removed her left hand from where Blake held it and placed it on Blake’s thigh.

Blake’s heart started to thud against her ribcage. She didn’t move the stray hand. From this angle, she could see down Yang’s shirt if she wanted to - no doubt part of Yang’s plan. Meanwhile, Yang had stopped still, waiting for Blake to either say no or continue at her own pace.

_ So that’s how it is,  _ Blake thought. Two could play at this game, she decided, and put as much of a low purr in her voice as she could manage. “‘Crooked?’ I hardly think such an honest, honorable huntress could be described as a ‘crook.’” She shifted her legs so she could lean forward more comfortably. Yang took that as a no to the hand and removed it, but Blake grabbed it before it could go far and put it back where it had been. (And if it was actually a little further up her thigh, who could tell? Certainly not her.) She looked up, directly into beautiful purple eyes that watched her with as much desire as she felt. That was encouraging.

“Oh yeah? And what makes you think I’m not a thief?” Yang said, raising one eyebrow teasingly.  _ Speaking of crooked _ , thought Blake,  _ that smile should probably be illegal. Gods damn, Yang. _

Smirking in return, Blake said, “Theft requires subtlety. You are…” She paused, and let her gaze drift down slowly for Yang’s benefit, across her unfair combination of powerful, muscular build and soft curves. “... _ many _ things, Yang,” she resumed eye contact, “but subtle is not one of them.”

“Oh yeah?” returned Yang, whose gaze flitted back and forth between Blake’s eyes and lips, “Well, I’ve got a heist currently in progress, and it’s going well so far.”

It was Blake’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “And what would that be?”

“As it happens,” said Yang, ever-so-slightly tilting her head to one side, “I’m stealing the heart of the girl I love - that is, if she’ll let me.” She dropped her gaze entirely to Blake’s lips. The two girls were less than an inch apart, and Blake’s heart was beating so hard she was sure Yang could hear it.

Blake nodded her head almost imperceptibly. “Of course,” she breathed.

Yang closed the miniscule distance between them. Blake closed her eyes, and the whole world seemed to melt away.  There was nothing else but Yang and the pure, soaring joy of kissing her. This time, there was no urgency, and Blake could draw out the kiss, matching Yang’s soft insistence. After a long moment, Yang broke the kiss and touched her forehead to Blake’s. “I love you,” said Yang.

Blake’s heart ached in the best way, and she felt lighter than air. She kissed Yang again, fiercer, but it wasn’t enough. She needed to get closer. Without breaking the kiss, she climbed into Yang’s lap, putting one arm around her waist and cradling her head in the other. Yang responded enthusiastically to the change in position, propping herself up on her right hand and burying the left in Blake’s hair to pull her closer. Kissing Yang felt like satisfying a gnawing hunger Blake hadn’t felt properly until then. She stopped for a breath and whispered, “I love you too. I love you so much. You stubbornly make my life better even when I don’t deserve it. I never stood a chance.”

Yang blushed. “Well, when you put it that way…” She pulled her hand from Blake’s hair and stroked her cheek instead, smiling gently. “I didn’t stand a chance either. I mean, you’re smart, and passionate, and genuinely kind, not to mention out-of-my-league sexy. And also a huge dork,” she teased, tapping Blake on the nose. “I trust you with my life. You’re my best friend, and somewhere along the way I realized you meant even more to me than that.”

“I can tell you the exact moment when I realized I felt the same thing,” said Blake, also blushing.

“Oh?” Yang grinned, eager for an explanation.

“It was the day you told me about your mom, actually. You hugged me in the middle of us shouting at each other, and I realized I didn’t want you to let go. I had to suppress the urge to kiss you right then and there. And as if that wasn’t enough,” she chuckled at the memory, “as you were leaving you winked and offered me a dance. I was floored. I thought you could read minds or something.”

Yang laughed. “I’m no mind reader, I was just desperately dropping hints. I may as well have put a glowing neon sign over my head that said ‘I like you! Please date me!’”

“Oddly enough, I couldn’t see any neon sign,” said Blake. She couldn’t help smiling too.

“As for me,” said Yang, “It wasn’t too long before that when I realized it myself. I had been kinda on the fence about whether it was a real crush or if I just loved being friends with you. It was after the food fight when I figured it out for sure. I fell back through the roof and you guys were all standing around. When I got up, I saw you laughing, and I’d never seen you smile that much before. I think my heart stopped for a second.”

“I guess I’ll have to smile more often,” said Blake. “Shouldn’t be too hard; you have that effect on me.” She was smiling as she said it.

Yang lowered her voice again and said, “Mmm, you have all kinds of effects on me.” Blake’s heart apparently had at one point stopped racing, which she knew because now it had started again.

“Kiss me again?” Blake asked.

Yang wasted no time with an answer. She took the lead this time, pressing forward and burying her left hand in Blake's hair (Blake supposed it was better to keep the other hand away, as it was likely to get caught and ruin the moment).

Blake began to kiss down Yang’s neck to her collarbone, and her upper ears twitched with delight to hear Yang's heavy breathing and breathy voice. “How did I get the hottest girlfriend on the planet?” gasped Yang.

Blake took Yang’s face in her hand, and tilted it back up toward her own. She leaned in and said, “Says the living embodiment of the phrase ‘bombshell blonde,’” before kissing her again. Blake lost herself in the kiss, and when Yang stopped, Blake almost groaned in disappointment. She was about to ask why they’d stopped when Yang’s stomach loudly answered that for her.

“When was the last time you ate?” asked Blake.

Sheepishly, Yang counted back the hours. “Twelve, no, fourteen, sixteen - too long.”

“Right. We’re getting breakfast.” Blake reluctantly disentangled herself from Yang and stood up.

“I think by now it’s probably lunch.” Yang sprang up from the bed, then turned to Blake and offered her elbow with a smirk. “My lady?”

Blake smiled and took her by the arm. “What a gentlewoman.” They left the room and began walking to the inn’s restaurant.

Yang chuckled. “Gentlewoman? Is that a thing?”

“Well, lady has a different connotation, and you’re not exactly a gentleman.”

“I feel like that was an insult but I’m not sure.”

“Well, I can call you a gentleman next time if you’d like,” said Blake. Yang laughed at that.

There was a moment of quiet as they walked down the hallway. Yang said, “You know, we’ll have to deal with that reporter eventually. Either her or someone else.”

Blake sighed. “Yeah.”

“You won’t have to do it alone.”

Blake squeezed Yang’s arm gently. “Nor will you.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> i made a masterpiece illustration for the bumblebee team attack and you can find it here: https://imgur.com/a/SxOkf
> 
> this took an embarrassingly long time to finish. like, i started this with the intention to finish it in time for the premiere of volume 4. i worked on this on and off and often put it off because it had tripled in length from its original size and became an absolute monster. this went through so many variations - there was a long period of time where instead of killing adam they handed him over to the schnees and then the bees' schnees escaped jacques with winter's help to go reunite with team rnjr. this version stays significantly more on-topic.
> 
> to whoever you were who i talked to at the V3 theatrical screening about my fix-it reunion fic (while i was cosplaying yang), this is it.


End file.
